Establishing Discipline and Mealtime Rules

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I'm going to say something that might make you uncomfortable. so sit tight We are slowly disabling our children And I don't say that likely I say that because I work with families continuously every day And I'm seeing a pattern that's growing. children who are capable but not being taught We're pushing children along on bikes instead of teaching them how to ride them. We're keeping children in strollers who should be walking, climbing, building strength We've got four year olds still using dummies when that was only ever meant to be a short term aid. seeven year olds who can't brush their teeth properly without an electric toothbrush, eight year olds who can't sit at a table and use a knife and fork, nine year olds who don't basically understand bathroom hygiene, and I find myself asking When did we stop teaching these life skills And before you get defensive, I understand modern life is busy. I do But this isn't about time It's about intention becausecause every time we step in and do it for them or avoid teaching because it's slower, messier, or inconvenient, we take away an opportunity for them to become capable. And children want to feel capable So we go back to basics parents Teach the bike ride in with support Then with're out. We remove the dummy when it's no longer needed. We show them how to brush their teeth properly, not rely on this electric door. We sit at the table and we teach them how to eat properly, we guide, we repeat, we expect. Not perfectly Consistently Because independence isn't something that just happens. It's taught parents. and if we don't teach it We can't be surprised when it's missing. So that's what you said. I commented on that. I said she's right, O of course, mealtime is a big part of the problem. Lots of parents negotiate with their children, allow them to not eat what was served or just serve them chick nuggets or mac and cheese for every meal. They don't teach table manners. They don't require that their children ask to be excused before leaving the table They let their kids use electronics at the table, etceter. complete disaster. And u Plenty of comments responded to that, plenty disagreeing We're in some cases agreeing, so we'll go through some of the comments Stephanie says I'm GenX. Nobody taught me these life skills. We had to figure this out ourselves kids getting too dumb to do this Nobody taught you life skills. This is totally a GenX thing, by the way. They love to brag about not being parented. Gen Xers love this There's not a lot we can say about Gen Xers U or that needs to be said But this is one thing about genenics. they love to brag. They love to brag about not having any real parenting as if that's something to be proud of If nobody taught you life skills, which is really like the whole job of a parent That's basically your entire gig. And if no one did that I can guess two things about you. One is your parents sucked two You probably don't actually have those life skills to the degree that you think you do And u, This is something you hear a lot from people with they'll say, well That's how I was raised and I turned out fine. I was raised that way. lookook at me. I turned out fine. And then you look at them and it's like, yeah, but no, you didn't Actually, you didn't turn out fine It's always the most dysfunctional people with lives of pure misery lives that you look at them and you're plunged into despair just by looking at them. And they're always the ones that go, I turned out. Hey, I turned out fine. No, you totally did not turn out fine you actually turned out really poorly Apparently no one's told you this, but cause you't have a parent to tell you Um Let's see. Dayne Harris says to say that we're more busy than our ancestors is wrong. They got up at four AM and worked till the sun went down outside and then did chores inside till midnight They didn't waste time with social media and chit chat and TV And somehow they found time to raise not one, not two, but average of seven children. how to wipe their own ass, have manners and respect elders by six years old. Us We're too consumed with ourselves. Yeah, I couldn't agree more Um I think you're absolutely right. So When parents today try to use the excuse of People in general are always using as an excuse. I'm too busy, I'm too busy First of all, you're not nearly as busy as you think you are And that goes for all of us, myself included. We all think that we're really busy Some of us are more busy than others In reality, if you were to just log the amount of time you spend a week simply staring at a screen. But you don't have to. I'm not talking about for work You would see that just there alone, you You got more than enough time. to do anything you want with your life and it's just being consumed and Part of the thing with the screen is that It eats up your time in a way that you don't feel This is one of the issues with it. It's got this lobotomizing effect when you're staring at a screen eat up like You could be looking at a screen for fifty two minutes and it feels like it was five. And that's one of the reasons why people think they're way busier than they are And You know, they get home from work, whatever, they put the kids to bed Then they get out their phone And they're stare at it and they look up at the clock and it's like, oh, it's already bedtim. You see, I had no time in between putting the kids to bed and now that I have to go to bed because I got to get work in the morning. Well, actually you had like three and a half hours, but you just spent it just like doing this with your phone all time. And that's why. U Patrick says, ah, yes, let's raise more subservient order followers and permission slip seekers could go wrong. Well, this is the dumbest thing Um This is the dumbest thing Yes You want to raise children to follow your orders and in many cases seek permission Of course, you want to raise your kids that way. That's called being obedient, being disciplined, being humble You think the problem is that kids today are too humble And too obedient Is that? Patrick, is that what you think You think the problem we have in society today is that kids are too obedient Too well behaved Um They they are they are too too prone to deferring to adults. You actually think that's our problem You know, something else, just so you know Every great man of history that you can name If you can name any, which you probably can't. Literally all of them every single one was a man who respected hierarchy and respected people in positions of legitimate authority. Definitely definitely respected the authority of a parent over a child Every single one. So this thing of o, no one's in charge of me. I don't have to listen to anybody that is That is no great man has ever had that attitude. Sorry Acknowledging that there are people in the world who know more than you, acknowledging that there are people who have authority that you do not have acknowledging that you owe respect to your superiors to your elders All of that is necessary for for to be a not just a great person, but to be a functional person in society One of the strangest things we've accepted in modern life is the idea that complete strangers should know everything about us. People get upset if their neighbor glances over the fence, they put blinds on their windows, they lock their front doors. But somehow, they're perfectly comfortable with internet companies, advertisers, data brokers, and who knows else, tracking what they do online all day long Apparently, privacy is sacred unless it happens on a screen. That's one reason I use ExpressVPN. I spend a lot of my day Of course online researching stories, reading articles, watching clips and generally wandering around the internet. And Id prefer the main interternet provider, advertisers and every random company on Earth build a profile on me while I do it. ExpressVPN creates a secure encrypted tunnel between your device and the internet, hides your online activity from your ISP, and makes it much harder for advertisers, data brokers, and other third parties to track what you're doing online. It's incredibly easy to use. I open the app, hit one button and that's it. 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So I'm not going to make my kids Have you not grown up at all Like, yeah, you're suppos to go through the phase as a child where your parents are telling you to do something And you really hate that you have to do it And so you say yourself, well, we're not When I'm a parent and I have kids, I'm never going to make them clean their room. This is so unfair. Yeah, when you're like twelve You might have that view But by the time you're thirty two, you should have grown up. Now when you're thirty two, you should be you should have gone through the evolution where you realize that, oh, no actually like Of course, you should clean your room. I'm glad my parents made me do that When I have kids or with my kids now, I'm definitely going to make them do those things You should be at that point when you're in your twenties and thirties and you've got a lot of like grown adults who still have the mentality of twelve year olds Um As a parent, if you are not making your kids do things that they don't want to do, then you're a terrible parent Because most of the basic duties and responsibilities around the house are things that your kid is not going to want to do because who would They're not going to want to clean the room. They're not to want to obey your rules. They're not going to want to Um You know, have to fgo eating ice cream whenever they want. and on and on and on, like all the thing, all the basic duties and responsibilities they're not going to want to do. and if you're if you as a parent are not making your kids do those things, then you just are failing in the most basic way as a parent I'm I mean, my parents tried to make me eat, but I was picky. They say you can't leave the table till you eat. I say, okay and not eat and then they'd get up for bed. And they'd make me what I want because they can'nt not feed their child Um I will die on the hill after Six kids There's no such thing as a picky eater Okay, that is a skill issue as a parent. I know parents get upset when I say this It's true There's no such thing as a picky eater. unless your kid like legitimately has some kind of mental issue I guess there can be cases like that, but putting those aside, if you have a, you know sort of normal, mentally healthy child Picky eater is a skill issue. That's a parenting iss We don't have picket eaters in our house. How did that happen? Six kids? six kids we don't have pick eat How do we do that? We just got luck No, it's really simple Eat what's put in front of you And if you don't eat that, then you won't eat anything Okay, and you hear these parents and say, Well, I try that and my kid will just refuse to eat How long is your kid gonna to go on this hunger strike before they just eat what's put in front of them Because I guarantee what you're doing is you're telling them, eat that or nothing And then they refuse. and then like an hour later, you feel bad because they're hungry. and so you make them chicken nuggets. That's what's happening What you have to be willing to do if you really have like a if the picky and really if you do this at a young age, you won't get to the picky eater phase. If you do get to that phase, then you're going to have to probablyably get to a point where, okay, you're not going to eat any dinner tonight. You're going to go to bed and you're going to be hungry It'll be you're not going to die, like your kids not going to starve to death. That's not going to happen But like you might have to get them to a point where they're actually really hungry And and they're begging you for a snack or like they're, you know, for what they want to eat and you just say no Sorry I know you're hgry but you're Here's your meal, likeike we're not we're not depriving you of food. It's right here. A delicious, gorgeous meal, please eat it But you might have to get to that point. so h and we've had You know, we've had, look, we've gone through this with our kids with a few of them in particular where they where they try they try it, they test it And they t you know, they test They try out being a picky eater And And so the rule is like you're not getting up from the table until you eat your food And we've had a few kids, a time or two that have said, okay, well, I'm not going It's like, okay, well then you're gonna sit there An hour and a half later, they're still sitting at the table. okay? But you're not getting up until you eat that You want to sit here for another five hours? That's on you And eventually it'll e U An comment says, this is half right. There is no call for kids to be to ask to be excused from the table. Do you ask to be excused? Is the table a prison Bad ideas lead to worse ones. Now I'm a big believer in having kids asked to be excused Do I ask to be excused from my own table? No, because it's my table because it's my table in my house with my food that I bought. And so no, I don't who am I going to ask No ask see, the kids ask me because I'm in charge. And this is all the stuff that I provided for them Who am I gonna to ask? I don't have anybody to ask. I don't have to ask I don't have to ask to be excused I can do whatever I want as far as that goes I'm not my child. I'm in charge. the child's not And so we're big believers in that. The kids should ask to be excused from the table. Is the table a prison? No, but my house is not a prison and yet They can't just walk outside and go wherever they want without asking me We're asking their mom It's not a prison It's not a prison but they like My six year old can't just disappear wherever she wants without getting any permission Obviously, Does that makeaking it a prison? No, it just means we are the parents. We are in charge You have rules to follow that we don't have to follow because we're the authority figures Um So and and you know, we we didn't I think if for a while we didn't do the whole like you have to ask to be excused. And I think probably ten years ago, I would have felt like, it's a little, you know I don't know. it's it's a little unnecessary As the kids have gotten older, I really that's when we started to instate this rule because Um, you know, When a dinner is prepared and effort's been put into preparing this dinner Now you're not just going to sit there at the table silently for five minutes and they just disappear Like no, it's's it's ungrateful. it's It's this is a family time. We're sitting at the table together and you can't as a child, decide to just put a Ki Bosh on family time and walk away from the table, not even saying thank you for the meal or anything. We're not going to allow that So Nobody should ever be forced to eat something against their will. It's cruel and creates bad eating habits That is insane someome of these people Nobody should be forced to eat something against the. Okay, what's the other option What is the other option So you're just gonna let your kid decide what their own diet is. You're gonna let your four year old So your four year old dec is going to be his own nutritionist, his own dietician You' gonna let your four year old decide every meal for himself That's insane. You're being a bad parent You're being a bad parent because you're refusing to do the job Being a parent is making these decisions for your family in many cases, making decisions that are right for your kid that they will not make because they don't know what's right and healthy for them. You do, you're the parent So you feed them hopefully a nice meal that has like protein and maybe some vegetables and stuff like that because they need it for their growing bodies They don't know that they need that And so you have to force that on them Um This is just basic parenting complepletely insane And it doesn't create bad eating habits, it does exactly the opposite All of my kids have like for kids have really good eating habits And they all just eat, we make a meal and they eat it Whatever it is, we make a healthy meal need That's about as good a eating habit as you can have And u That's all it takes. I finally scrappy little text and says, I agree But I haven't figured out the magic trick to keep my five and seven year old seated at the dinner table. It drives us crazy Yeah, well look Um Seven years old this should not be a problem anymore. All you know, five is a little bit on the T I mean, really Um, Once your kid starts eating solid foods and they're sort of at the dinner table at that point, from that age until about You know, maybe like three and a half four can be a little rough And you just have to get through it. By seven years old, they should certainly be at a point where where they can sit at the table. politely and basically still the food and at seven years old if you can't get them to sit down and eat dinner Um They should they should have that skill by now at seven. I mean, seven is late in the game. So The trick, which is not magic is just consequence. And I think this is where parents flinch This is where parents very often flinch And you're at the point, you're long sense at the point in my opinion, where the consequences should be pretty severe. for the seven year old And that's but by severe, all I mean is something as simple as If you don't sit still at the table and eat in a civilized way Um If you're bouncing all over the place, you're not sitting down, you're trying to make it all about you. This is family dinner time. It's not about you. You're going to sit down, you're going to be civilized and polite And if you're not going to do that then we're going to send you to bed without dinner and you actually have to do it Yeah know, it's basically all the old fashioned stuff that like our parents and grandparents did You know, that was actually right. You should be doing that. Sending your kid to bed without dinner should be a thing that you do sometimes if you need to And I'm telling you right now, especially at seven, like that'll make that'll make an impression And we've had to do that a few times with our kids for various reasons, and not very often We've got a few kids where, you know It's like six o'clock and you're going to bed You know, you're Bed without dinner, do that a few times, makes an impression And and that's what consequences should be. They have to be something that is unpleasant for the child. notot going to hurt the child U anything like that, they're perfectly safe. It will make an impression and it will be really, uncomfortable for them and And they're not going to enjoy it And that's what you have to do. So I think I think with your seven year old, you could break him of this habit. in span of twelve hours Just w try it tonight Give them a couple of warnings. I'm sure you've already given them a million warnings if you're seven And but if he doesn't listen to that, okay, you're going to bed You're not going eat go to b Something tells me the next day he's going to be seated at the dinner table very politely and he's going to e what's put in front of him. That's the way kids work It's not that hard I mean, it's, you know what, it is hard. Being a parent is hard. I I'll backtrack. It is hard. It is difficult, but it's simple, especially with young kids. It's not complicated. It's not complicated. even if it is hard That's it. Okay, bye